Jeff Clark (poet)
Jeff Clark (born 1971) is an American poet and book designer. Life Clark grew up in southern California. He studied at University of California, Davis, and completed a Master of Fine Arts in poetry at the Iowa Writers' Workshop. At Davis, Clark drummed for the band Buick, whose album Sweatertongue was released by Lather Records in 1992. He also drummed for the Popealopes, and is featured on their album Slowest Eye, released by Italy's Helter Skelter Records. In 1995, he graduated from the Iowa workshop and moved to San Francisco, where he wrote poetry and edited a zine, Faucheuse. He also worked for Wilsted & Taylor, a book design studio in Oakland, California. Book Design Clark's book design studio, Quemadura, is based in Ypsilanti, Michigan. He has composed book covers and interiors for, among others, Flood Editions, Leon Works, Kelsey Street Press, the Jargon Society, Essay Press, Wake Forest University Press, Ahsahta Press, Dalkey Archive Press, Wave Books, Turtle Point Press, Farrar Straus Giroux, Black Square Editions, City Lights Books, the Ulrich Museum of Art, and MOCAD (Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit). He also designs the covers for Two Lines, the literary journal from the Center for the Art of Translation. In January 2008, Publisher's Weekly wrote: "Clark has become one of poetry's most prolific and influential book designers, whose distinctive treatments—characterized by spacious covers; hip, angular fonts; varied elements that elide into one another—a frequent poetry reader could recognize from a distance."Craig Morgan Teicher, "A Poet's Cover," Publisher's Weekly, January 28, 2008. Writing Clark's first book, The Little Door Slides Back, was published by Sun & Moon Press in 1997, and reprinted in 2004 by Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. John Yau, writing in Boston Review, said that Clark evoked "a fragile, interior world largely lit by the moon, cheap paperbacks, and noir movies, a place in which predicaments and paradoxes abound."John Yau, [http://bostonreview.net/BR22.6/Yau.html "Review of The Little Door Slides Back,"] Boston Review, December 1997/January 1998. Farrar Straus Giroux also published Clark's second collection, Music and Suicide. John Beer in Chicago Review said "its ambition is more erotic than programmatic, which makes it hard to place in a critical landscape dominated by twin towers of linguistic materialism and idle taste-mongering. But if this erotic ambition is one more aspect of Clark's untimeliness, that untimeliness may allow him to escape mere datedness to disclose a new poetic future for us all." In 2000, German artist Cosima von Bonin created an installation entitled The Little Door Slides Back for the Kunstverein Braunschweig. Also in 2000, Z Press published Sun On 6, which was printed by Leslie Miller at The Grenfell Press. In addition to Clark's poem, it contains Jasper Johns' first linocut.http://www.artnet.com/auctions/artists/jasper-johns/sun-on-six In June 2006, Clark and Geoffrey G. O'Brien released 2A, an experimental collaboration in poetry. In 2009, Turtle Point Press published Ruins, a limited edition book that Clark wrote, illustrated, and designed. Recognition The Little Door Slides Back, was a 1996 winner of the National Poetry Series award. Murder and Suicide received the 2004 James Laughlin Award."Jeff Clark Receives 2004 James Laughlin Award,", Stanza, September 8, 2004, Academy of American Poets. Poets.org, Web, Aug. 31, 2016. Publications Poetry *''The Little Door Slides Back''. Los Angeles: Sun & Moon Press, 1997. *''Sun on 6'' (with linocut by Jasper Johns). Calais, VT: Z Press, 2000. *''Music and Suicide''. New York: Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, 2004. *''2A'' (with Geoffrey G. O'Brien). Ypsilanti, MI: Quemadura / Milwaukee, WI: : Woodland Pattern Book Center, 2006. Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.Search results = au:Jeff Clark, WorldCat, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc. Web, Aug. 31, 2016. See also *List of U.S. poets References External links ;Poems *Jeff Clark 2 poems at the Academy of American Poets ;Design *[http://www.quemadura.net/p63.html Third and final issue of Faucheuse] ;Audio / video *Buick at last.fm *Popealopes at last.fm ;Books *Jeff Clark at Amazon.com ;About *Jeff Clark interview at the Poetry Society of America *[http://www.cosmoetica.com/D36-DES27.htm review of Music and Suicide] Category:1971 births Category:American male poets Category:University of California, Davis alumni Category:People from Ypsilanti, Michigan Category:Living people Category:Book designers Category:21st-century poets Category:American poets Category:English-language poets Category:Poets